maybe all the talk over the Zeroscillator during the past year has finally gotten to me.
no way I'm gonna buy one, where's the fun in that?
so i have been drooling over the Electronotes thru-zero VCO (the one in Preferred circuits)
has somebody tried this design? like it? Or general opinions on thru-Zero?

maybe all the talk over the Zeroscillator during the past year has finally gotten to me.
no way I'm gonna buy one, where's the fun in that?
so i have been drooling over the Electronotes thru-zero VCO (the one in Preferred circuits)
has somebody tried this design? like it? Or general opinions on thru-Zero?

I've always thought this one looked interesting. It's part of Henry's frequency shifter:

it is somewhat different.
all my 13700s are spoken for though
Most designs seem to use switching and/or gates in combination with the transcond. amps. (Electronotes version has a 4013, 4070 and 3080s)
we best not forget Mr Tillman's trapezoid quadrature oscillator with thru-zero capabilities -
http://www.till.com/articles/QuadTrapVCO/vcocore.html
it looks very elegant, i guess some output circuitry would have to be decided upon. there is a good read about the benefits of low voltage operation and local regulation.

Any suggestions on setting up Henry's as a stand-alone module?
it seems from the output circuitry it is designed to be wired directly into the next stage of his freq shifter.
Would a couple of op-amps wired as unity gain buffers and say 300-1k resistors, before the jacks, do the job?

Any suggestions on setting up Henry's as a stand-alone module?
it seems from the output circuitry it is designed to be wired directly into the next stage of his freq shifter.
Would a couple of op-amps wired as unity gain buffers and say 300-1k resistors, before the jacks, do the job?

The outputs are already connected to buffers, so you can just hang your standard (1k) output resistor off of where the marked output terminals are.

I'm not sure about what the output voltage levels are, though. You could e him.

i built the EN thru zero oscillator on stripboard.
Not too hard, worked straight away.
haven't played with it a lot (panel not finished) but it definitely does things regular VCOs can't, plenty of strange new sounds are waiting to be discovered.

i built the EN thru zero oscillator on stripboard.
Not too hard, worked straight away.
haven't played with it a lot (panel not finished) but it definitely does things regular VCOs can't, plenty of strange new sounds are waiting to be discovered.

perfboard?! so thats what its called - sorry to be confusing i used perfboard.
i've always called any of these blank boards 'strip board'

well its perfboard -

problem with doing a run of PCBs is the schematic is not freely available without Bernie's permission. Though this design is in the Preferred Circuits collection, which is quite cheap ($20 - $30 ??? can't remember, I've got the everything collection)

perfboard?! so thats what its called - sorry to be confusing i used perfboard.
i've always called any of these blank boards 'strip board'...problem with doing a run of PCBs is the schematic is not freely available without Bernie's permission.

Well, I guess people aren't consistent with the nomenclature. To me, stripboard has ... well ... strips.
Your board looks exactly like most of the things I make. Except I usually use lots of vector clips to make it easier to change components for experimental circuits.
Bernie is quite approachable, and would most likely give you permission to make boards. He considers himself in the publishing business, not manufacturing. Worth a try!

...we best not forget Mr Tillman's trapezoid quadrature oscillator with thru-zero capabilities -
http://www.till.com/articles/QuadTrapVCO/vcocore.html
it looks very elegant, i guess some output circuitry would have to be decided upon. there is a good read about the benefits of low voltage operation and local regulation.

I would definitely be interested in some PCBs for one (or more) of the through zero VCO designs. I think a lot of people would like something similar to the zeroscillator but can't drop $1000 for one.

According to a note I just got from Bernie, he will put up individual projects at the EN website if people request them. He says so far no one has done this. Why not ask him to put the thru-zero VCO up and at the same time ask him if it would be OK to sell PCBs?

Seems there will be Pro PCB's offered for the Electronotes Preferred Circuits Through Zero Oscillator. I expect they will be available in Aug (next month) I will be putting up a separate thread soon so you may sign up to let me know you are interested.

Here's how it came about:

I saw this post by Ian before I left for Yosemite and immediately sent two emails; one to Andrew F, and the other to Bernie Hutchins. I saw that each had replied when I returned a few minutes ago. Andrew said he wasn't interested in producing boards and wished me luck in doing so. And Bernie said, in part:

"Hi Randaleem -

I will put up the through-zero in a couple of days.

Actually, my only interest are in the preservation of
copyright and the proper attribution of intellectual
property. For example, I think the through-zero idea
originally came from Charlie Thompson - this is one of
the things I need to check."

So it looks like it's a go. I'll need to make a quick check of relevent patents to be sure we won't be violating anyone's IP (Bernie suggested this as well). Barring that; these PCB's will soon be available.

I also want to mention That I asked Bernie about doing PCB's, kits and completed modules based on other circuits from his vast collection; and it seems those will be a go as well. So watch for my posts as these get under way.

Gonna -continue to- be an exciting Summer and fall in SDIY!

Randal

frijitz wrote:

kryptic wrote:

I would definitely be interested in some PCBs for one (or more) of the through zero VCO designs. I think a lot of people would like something similar to the zeroscillator but can't drop $1000 for one.

According to a note I just got from Bernie, he will put up individual projects at the EN website if people request them. He says so far no one has done this. Why not ask him to put the thru-zero VCO up and at the same time ask him if it would be OK to sell PCBs?

... Seems there will be Pro PCB's offered for the Electronotes Preferred Circuits Through Zero Oscillator. I expect they will be available in Aug (next month) I will be putting up a separate thread soon so you may sign up to let me know you are interested...

And Bernie said, in part:
Actually, my only interest are in the preservation of
copyright and the proper attribution of intellectual
property. For example, I think the through-zero idea
originally came from Charlie Thompson - this is one of
the things I need to check."

Hey, good news!

One minor point -- the oscillator in question was designed by Jan Hall. As far as I know, nobody seems to know where Jan is these days. I've run across several of the other EN contributors (Terry Michaels, Lester Ludwig, Charlie Thompson, etc.) in recent years, but not Jan. If anyone happens to know ...

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